Congratulations!

You have Arrived.

So you have finally begun your journey and officially launched your business…congratulations!

Your journey hasn’t been easy…it never is…nor was it meant to be. The journey towards becoming an entrepreneur and experiencing your new found freedom can at times be daunting and is usually filled with more potholes and bumps than you probably imagined….

Eat dirt!

Having the lights cut off…and your car nearly reposed is certainly not in the 5-year projection for your business plan… Remember your BIG idea...the one that you knew was going to make you a millionaire…. in like a year? Yea…that one…

Here you are, several years later still struggling…and the truth of the matter…IF you are honest with yourself…is that doubt may be slowly creeping in… That BIG Idea that once felt like a colorful outfit bursting with colors…can over time eventually feel more like a pair of worn & faded socks…especially after enough rejections….missteps…and unforgiving mistakes.

Take courage… you are not alone… And BY the way…Let me remind you of one important truth…you should never despise small beginnings.

Every popular brand started as a small concept… remember Whole Foods? Well guess what the idea for that brand started from two twenty-year-olds-one a college dropout-who wanted to start a natural food store in Texas. (1). Today the annual revenue has exceeded more than $12 Billion dollars. How about Apple which was launched by Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak in a garage in 1976…today it’s just worth about 1 gazillion dollars right? (1). While we are on the tech vertical how about Dell Computers….Michael Dell launched that business out a University of Texas dorm room with a small investment of $1,000…now that company is worth in excess of $100 million dollars. (1).

…and yours will likely start small as well …BUT that does not mean it cannot be successful. It is not so much about the amount of resources that you have…it really boils down to your perseverance AND your resourcefulness…

Don’t worry if others don’t immediately catch your vision…as your momentum grows others will begin to get excited right along with you and start to see what you see…BUT you cannot wait for others to get onboard before you start running…

Sometimes passion and mission can become misunderstood…

Both are important but only mission can keep you moving in a necessary direction… when your passion seems to have vanished… There will be different phases of growth experienced during the life of your business…. new seasons…. truthfully, you will feel lost at times… like you are traveling without a compass…down a dark twisted road…in the middle of nowhere… with a flashlight that only seems to tease the darkness…without truly illuminating your pathway...well don’t worry…that is natural too.

What is MOST important is to remain focused on the mission, or as often stated by various motivational Guru’s.…your WHY. When your WHY is big enough then the HOW will reveal itself.

However….if your why is not big enough then the moment you face a considerable obstacle…you will fold and eventually give up. Statistics may appear daunting…

20% of small businesses fail in their first year, 30% of small businesses fail in their second year, and 50% of small businesses fail after five years in business. Finally, 70% of small business owners fail in their 10th year in business. (2)

But you don’t have to BE a statistic of another failed business…remember….

The real victory is not what is done in the light… .but what is accomplished when the lights are off… or barely visible… it is the sweat of lifting those weights to build muscles when your whole body is aching with pain… it is making 20 more calls at 6:00 pm when you know your co-workers left an hour ago… to Happy Hour… but you stay back in order to close a sale… even when the previous 10 callers either did not give you time to finish your pitch, or sternly reminded you to remove their name from your list….

Do you just rationalize quitting…turning out the lights….appeasing yourself with the belief that no one wants to by your product…because it’s Christmas eve and all their shopping is done….

Or whatever you try to rationalize in an effort not to keep being rejected…